Russian Rocket Launches American Communications Satellite

A Russian Proton rocket lifts off on April 25, carrying the SES-1 (AMC-4R) communications satellite.

Credit: Khrunichev

PARIS  A Russian rocket lofted a new satellite into orbit
that will be used for telecommunications in the United States.

An International Launch Services (ILS) Proton
rocket on Sunday successfully placed the SES-1 telecommunications satellite
into a near-geostationary orbit about nine hours after liftoff from the
Russian-run Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. The satellite's owner, SES of
Luxembourg, said it had acquired signals that the satellite was healthy
following separation from Proton's Breeze-M upper stage.

SES-1, built by Orbital Sciences Corp. of Dulles, Va., will
be moved into final geostationary
orbit about 36,000 kilometers above the equator in the coming weeks and is
expected to be ready for operations by SES by late May.

The satellite, formerly known as AMC-4R, will be operated
from SES World Skies' 101 degrees west orbital slot over North America and will
replace the AMC-2 and AMC-4 spacecraft there now. SES-1 uses Orbital's Star
2.4-E platform and carries 24 C- band and 24 Ku-band transponders.

SES, which has entered into multi-satellite launch contracts
with Reston, Va.-based ILS and with the Arianespace consortium of Europe,
contracted with Orbital for three nearly identical satellites, with an option
for two more.

SES-1 weighed 2,550 kilograms at launch,
making it a light load for the Proton-Breeze-M, which can lift satellites
weighing more than 6,000 kilograms into geostationary transfer position.

The available power relative to the light weight of the
satellite permitted Proton to drop off SES-1 into a circular equatorial orbit
less than 2,000 kilometers below the geostationary arc, which is the
destination of most communications satellites. That permitted SES-1 to use less
of its own on-board fuel than it would have otherwise, resulting in an
estimated service life of 16 years rather than the standard 15 years.

SES-1 uses the same basic Star-2 platform design used by the
Intelsat Galaxy 15 satellite that lost communications with ground teams earlier
this month. Orbital officials said the most probable cause is the violent solar
storms that occurred in the first week of April.

SES Chief Executive Romain Bausch said SES continued with
its launch without waiting for the Galaxy 15 anomaly-review board's final
conclusions because SES-1 includes backup systems that are not on board Galaxy
15.

The launch was the 22nd Proton flight in 21 months and the
third mission for ILS  which sells Proton on the commercial market  this
year. The company has said it hopes to conduct 7-8 commercial launches in 2010
after seven in 2009.

Charles Q. Choi is a contributing writer for Space.com and Live Science. He covers all things human origins and astronomy as well as physics, animals and general science topics. Charles has a Master of Arts degree from the University of Missouri-Columbia, School of Journalism and a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of South Florida. Charles has visited every continent on Earth, drinking rancid yak butter tea in Lhasa, snorkeling with sea lions in the Galapagos and even climbing an iceberg in Antarctica.